BJP state president seems helpless before coal companies

Interestingly the BJP heavy weight for Jharkhand the government at Centre to considerately look into the matter and issue directives to the coal companies.Jaideep Deogharia | TNN | December 25, 2015, 07:28 IST

Ranchi: Jharkhand BJP President Dr. Ravindra Rai seems helpless in getting the coal companies abide by law of the land. The state unit president who is also MP Koderma happens to be a permanent member of the standing committee of parliament on coal and power. Understanding well that his own party is in power, both at Centre and in the state he was not prepared to embarrass the government by raising a question, instead he invoked rule 377 of the rules of procedure and conduct of business in Loksabha to bring to government’s notice how the coal companies have been abandoning the open cast mines after extracting coal and leaving them as ditches.

Rai on Wednesday placed the notice which explained how coal companies in the collieries—Dhanbad, Bokaro, Bermo, Giridih, Hazaribag and Ramgarh have extracted seven thousand tons of coal from open cast mines leaving behind huge ditches. “The coal companies are supposed to reclaim the land by filling them up and ensuring plantation so that they can be returned to the land owners (raiyaat),” he said. Rai informed the house that coal companies, particularly coal India has not been filling up the ditches which are often more than 50 feet deep and in the rainy season become death trap for animals. “When animals fall into these ditches, die and decompose it becomes a major health and environmental issue,” his notice read. Rai pointed out that these ditches also serve as appropriate hideout for the miscreants and anti social elements.

Interestingly the BJP heavy weight for Jharkhand the government at Centre to considerately look into the matter and issue directives to the coal companies.

It is not the first occasion when BJP politicians from Jharkhand have appeared helpless before coal India and its subsidiaries. Earlier, minister of food and civil supplies in the state government Saryu Rai had raised the issue of coal companies and its washeries polluting water of river Damodar and adding pollutants to Jharkhand environment beyond permissible limits. He had to approach union minister for coal and Power Piyush Goyal who in turn had given three month time to the coal companies to set their effluents and discharges from the washeries besides ensuring that not a single drop of untreated water is released into the rivers. More than six months have passed the companies are yet to comply with the directive or send any report in this regard.